Rosa Joanna Farrell

Amano Version

Final Fantasy IV

I'd always wanted to make an Amano based costume and since I was on a Rosa kick at the time (Don't ask I don't even know...) I picked her to be my first Amano project.

The wig I bought as a wavy wig, really long. I cut some of the length, straightened it just enough and cut and styled the front part and pulled the top and sides up into a ponytail.

The hair clip... Bun cover, tiara thing I made by braiding three very small wires together while putting beads into it at various points. I'm pretty proud of it, it was really hard to weave all that wire together without it breaking! The forehead piece and all the stuff it attaches to were hand-beaded with seed beads.

The shoulder pauldrons were made from a cardboard base, covered with paper clay, sanded to a certain point, a point where it's smooth but not SUPER smooth, which was what I wanted for a more... Organic look, I guess? I added the purple gems and then decorated the outer rims of the purple gems with more seed beads and added the gold fringe because I thought it looked nice. Yes, I know the gold fringe isn't accurate but I like it. :)

The bodice is made from a combination of gold sheer fabric, black interlock knit, white suede, white irridescent prom dress fabric, and cotton. The bodice is fully steel boned and features hand embroidery and hand-beaded swirls all across the bottom, as well as on the bust. The trim for the straps on the bodice and the black trim around the bust are each made from three sets of different trims/cords and braided together for thickness.

The panties were made from a pinkish purplish knit I found at JoAnn, also hand beaded for the weird designs she has on them. The butt cape thing is made from an old GoodWill belt that had a cool buckle, yellow brocade, white fringe, and a few hand beads.

The gloves/sleeves and hand cover things were fully hand embroidered and beaded (did I mention there were lots of beads? =P). The knee plates are made from foam and hot glue, weathered just a bit. Honestly I think they look a bit silly, but it's so hard to interpret what exactly is on her knees in the Amano since his art always cuts her legs off at the knee. XP

The ankle pieces and shoes I made up since her feet are never pictured in the Amano art (except for that one Amano picture I found of her where the FF logo covers her feet... Bleh...) They were made from some pink shoes that I covered with white fabric and then hand beaded. The ankle pieces are some white suede I also beaded to match the shoes... Because I thought they were cute.

The bow is made from cardboard, paperclay, jewels and beads to match the shoulder plates and some brown suede wrapped around it because I LIKED IT. I made the bow to match the shoulder plates because I can and I'm a cool kid like that.

I honestly really hate this outfit, it didn't come out at all the way I pictured it, though overall I think it looks nice. I feel like if I keep this costume around I'll never really finish it and will keep wanting to add and change things on it, so I must get in the rest of my photoshoots and retire the poor thing so I can start another sanity-killing mass destruction journey of beads and embroidery.